Kiss Me if You Can Novel Completed - Chapter 11

By a rough estimate, he had been submerged for nearly a minute. If he had been lying in the water like that before Josh found him, it would have been a much longer time.

But Chase showed no signs of being out of breath. He merely scrunched his brow, as if Josh’s arm around his head was extremely unpleasant. Josh, flustered, let go of him.

“I-I’m sorry.”

When he apologized in a hurry, Chase said nothing. He just stared at him. Josh, embarrassed, ran a hand through his wet hair. They floated, fully submerged in the water, looking at each other. His wet clothes were slowly getting heavy. Josh thought he should get out and quickly thought of something to say.

“Uh, well, I’ll just go now.”

As he spoke with an awkward smile, Chase narrowed his eyes. Josh couldn’t understand the meaning of that expression at all.

Can I go?

He blinked, bewildered, when Chase suddenly opened his mouth.

“You, do you really want to die this time?”

“Pardon?”

Josh, momentarily unable to grasp the meaning, blurted out a question. Then, Chase suddenly reached out his hand.

There was no time for him to even let out a small cry of “Uh.” He was immediately shoved headfirst into the water.

“…!”

With a loud splash, water sprayed everywhere. Josh thrashed, gulping down pool water. The intense California sunlight, refracted through the water, hurt his eyes. But what was more dangerous was Chase’s hand pressing down from above.

Over six feet tall and lean, he had just the right amount of muscle, so the term “muscular” didn’t quite fit him. “Sleek physique that suits a suit perfectly” was more accurate.

He was taller than Josh, but probably had less muscle mass, so what was this terrifying strength? He felt like he was truly going to die like this, but he couldn’t break free.

Josh desperately reached out. If he didn’t pull this man down, he would die. He moved desperately to survive. Just as the oxygen in his body was running out, his fingertips fortunately brushed Chase’s arm. He immediately pulled down with all his might.

“Phew!”

He finally broke free from Chase’s grip and surfaced. He quickly tried to escape, fearing another attack, but his body didn’t move as easily as he wanted. As he frantically stroked away, Chase reached out from behind him. He was grabbed by the hair and dragged back into the water.

His breath hitched, and a sensation like his lungs were swelling squeezed his entire body. The fear of death filled his mind. He tried to break free, but Chase held him and wouldn’t let go.

Fear made Josh’s breathing even more ragged. Seeing his face turn pale, Chase smiled strangely.

It was then that Josh realized. This man genuinely intended to kill him.

At that moment, Pete’s face flashed before his eyes, and he gripped Chase’s wrist with superhuman strength. Of course, Chase didn’t budge at that. But as he continued to press on the veins, Chase’s grip inevitably loosened. Taking advantage of the opening, Josh frantically rose to the surface.

Chase was still in the water. But thanks to the clear sun and transparent water, his movements were all too obvious. The moment Josh confirmed Chase approaching him, he quickly backed away.

This crazy bastard again.

He was confident in his swimming. He frantically stroked faster than ever towards the edge of the pool. Without hesitation, he pushed off the bottom and climbed out onto dry land, finally feeling safe.

“Ugh, ugh.”

After several retches and spitting out water, he finally came to his senses. He had no strength left in his body. His vision was blurry, as if he had died and come back to life. He gasped for breath and looked back; Chase was still there. As if he had no intention of chasing him.

Hah, Josh exhaled with a sigh and ragged breaths. He was finally able to speak after a few more retches.

“What are you doing? Are you crazy?”

Chase showed no change at the violent shout. Instead, he even smiled faintly.

“You touched my body without permission.”

“…!”

Josh gritted his teeth, suppressing the curses that threatened to erupt. Unable to control his tightly clenched fist, he swung it in the air and then shouted, a beat too late.

“I thought you were drowning! I thought you were going to die!”

Despite Josh’s protest, Chase remained shameless.

“I didn’t ask you to save me.”

This time, he didn’t hold back. Josh, furious, yelled,

“Damn it, then why did you hire a bodyguard? Just die alone, you crazy bastard!”

Even with the fiery outburst of anger, Chase remained calm. He simply ran his long fingers through his wet, dripping hair and chuckled briefly, as usual. So nonchalantly.

“It’s not easy to die. There are too many meddlers like you.”

“Ah, like me, whom you hired to meddle?”

Suddenly, Chase’s face hardened like a mask. But Josh didn’t care about such things. He punched the tree hard.

“If you’re going to die, die somewhere no one can see you, so you’ll definitely succeed! You crazy fucking bastard!”

After cursing “Fuck!” again, Josh immediately turned and left. His shoes must have fallen into the water, as the grass crunched under his wet socks. No sound came from behind him. He didn’t care what expression Chase had, or what other crazy thing he was doing.

Josh gritted his teeth and kept walking. Wishing he could just leave for the other side of the world.

“Didn’t I tell you to be careful and not touch him as much as possible?”

Mark burst out in indignation the moment he saw a soaking wet Josh. Isaac asked worriedly,

“Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?”

Josh just nodded silently. He had swallowed so much water that his stomach was churning. When he suddenly retched again, spitting out water mixed with stomach acid, Isaac quickly held out a trash can.

“Thanks.”

He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and barely managed to say thank you. Isaac, still with a shadowed face, said, “It’s okay.” Seth, who had been silently watching Josh frantically rub his hair with a towel Isaac had brought from somewhere, spoke up.

“Did the contract include a clause allowing the assault of bodyguards? I don’t recall seeing that.”

If it wasn’t for anyone else, Seth would have meticulously scrutinized every word of the contract. Everyone looked at Mark with anticipation, and he replied,

“It says that accidents occurring during security duty are considered the individual’s fault.”

“Ha.”

Seth let out a short sigh. Would this also be included in ‘that accident’? Josh didn’t know, but Chase Miller’s lawyer would surely talk his way out of it with all sorts of excuses.

He shouldn’t have signed the contract in the first place.

As the same thought crossed everyone’s minds, Henry entered.

“What the hell did you do to end up like that?”

No one said anything to him as he clicked his tongue. Henry grinned and casually slumped into a chair.

“Everyone has to take care of themselves. There must be a reason they pay this much money, right?”

This time, everyone’s gaze turned to Henry. He seemed strangely in a good mood. Isaac asked in a quiet voice,

“…Did you win money?”

At that, Henry grinned and pulled several hundred-dollar bills from his back pocket.

“Today, the cards just stuck to my hand.”

“Ahem.”

Mark cleared his throat. After getting everyone’s attention, he spoke.

“This is important. About C’s schedule.”

The serious atmosphere made everyone quiet. Mark looked around at his team members and continued.

“He’s going out next week.”

“Going out?”

When Seth repeated the question, Mark rubbed his brow as if he had a headache and replied,

“Yes. It’s not a sudden schedule, it was already planned. He needs to go for a costume fitting. They say it’s for a movie that’s about to start filming.”

Josh vaguely remembered hearing about it. That it was a movie with an enormous production budget, that the original novel was an old series with a huge fandom, and that Chase, who was initially considered for the lead role as the hero, unexpectedly took on the role of his enemy, the anti-hero.

“In that case, we’ll need to pay more attention to security…”

Everyone agreed with Seth’s despondent murmur. Inside the mansion, there were CCTV and various facilities, but outside, they literally had to cover every situation with their bare bodies.

The biggest problem was Chase Miller himself. For the members who had witnessed all his crazy antics, it was nothing short of a spine-chilling situation.

“Even so, there was an incident recently.”

Mark said with a troubled expression.

“They say the culprit was from a religious group hostile to extreme Alphas, and Keith Pittman was attacked.”

“The P Entertainment CEO?”

Pittman was the CEO of the production company making the movie Chase was set to star in, and he was also an extreme Alpha. He was also the one who assigned Chase the anti-hero role, despite him initially being considered for the hero role. Mark nodded at Seth’s question.

“That means C being threatened isn’t just empty talk. Plus, there was also talk that fans stormed the broadcasting station he appeared on last time and caused a huge commotion.”

“…Should we form a scrum?”

Henry immediately ground his teeth at Isaac’s hesitant suggestion.

“You just shut up and stay put, you idiot.”

It wasn’t a remark that deserved such a harsh insult, but it was true that Isaac lacked tact, so Josh didn’t bother to comfort him. Seth also turned his head, pretending not to notice. Mark sighed and said,

“First, let’s decide on teams for guarding during the work, and the rest will survey the surroundings and set up routes…”

“I’ll survey the surroundings.”

Josh raised his hand first, not wanting to miss the opportunity. Mark nodded, then divided Josh, Isaac, and himself into the reconnaissance team, and designated Seth and Henry as Chase’s close protection team.

“Mark, are you messing with me right now?”

Henry immediately protested, but no one responded. It was a job someone had to do, and it didn’t matter as long as it wasn’t them. In the end, Henry, with a very angry face, reluctantly accepted the mission.